Dixons and Carphone Warehouse announce merger

As widely reported last week, UK tech retail giants Dixons and Carphone Warehouse have revealed that they are to merge, creating one of the biggest high street technology brands in the country. Dixons CEO Sebastian James announced the news today while reporting trading details for the financial year, according to BBC News.

"Today we also announce that we are setting out on a new journey with Carphone Warehouse and it is good to be in such a strong position as we embark on this adventure.", James is quoted as saying. "The ability to take what we have built in electrical retailing and add the profound expertise of Carphone Warehouse in connectivity would make us a leading force in retailing for a connected world. Together we can create a seamless experience for our customers that will enable technology to deliver what it promises - that is, to make their lives better."

Precise details of the merger have not yet been confirmed, but earlier reports indicated that the new Dixons Carphone Group would be formed as part of a £3.7 billion ($6.2 billion) deal in which both Dixons and CPW are equal partners.

Following the demise of Curry's, Dixon's doesn't really have a high street competitor now, and the only real threat to CPW is Phones4u, whose turnover is a fraction of CPW.
Neither Dixon's nor CPW directly compete with one another, so I don't see how this merger has any grounds for blocking by the MMC.

I recently bought a Canon lens - ONLY because of Canons cash back did I get price parity with Germany - otherwise the UK would be 20% more expensive...
(from a shop that was already very cheap/on Amazon's level - I can highly recommend Harrison Cameras in Sheffield to those in the UK.)

My laptop, the same story... with luck I found a company selling me a slightly lower spec model (128GB SSD instead of 256GB and an HSDPA modem instead of 4G) for just about the same price as I could get the top model for in Germany...
The regular price on Amazon for my model would be a good 15% higher and the top model on Amazon UK would be nearly 50% higher than the top model in Germany...
(A Fujitsu Lifebook U904)

I end up buying some stuff in the UK because there is no way round it of you live here, but with few exceptions. Some items cost roughly the same, but many or maybe even most things are just overpriced compared to other European countries....

I just bought a z10 from cpw today for my 11 year old son today. Great deal, but two separate sales people tried to get me to buy another type of phone, though I asked for it specifically... until the second guy finally got it when I explained the awesome aspects of the z10. lol, he got very offended when I said, are you an iPhone guy, so there's hope yet.
Can't wait till my son gets to try his z10, big step up from his clunky old BlackBerry torch (a hand me down, from me).

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